


Family

by sonictrowel



Series: Long Night in the Blue House [52]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Family Feels, Flash Forward, Gen, Plot Twists
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-18
Updated: 2017-06-18
Packaged: 2018-11-15 11:11:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11229738
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sonictrowel/pseuds/sonictrowel
Summary: She spotted them not very far into the park, spread out on a huge flat stone with a familiar looking picnic hamper.  Three figures, and at a distance Milly recognised the young, bow tied Doctor from pictures and that particularly memorable bit with the cooking show.  And the woman with flaming red hair.





	Family

_Amy & Rory,_ 

_River wanted you to have some pictures of us so you’d know it’s me, but I expect that’s actually made it a bit more confusing.  Old man, attack eyebrows, stationary house (in case you couldn’t tell, it’s the TARDIS,) and a baby?  But... it’s me.  Promise._

_Hello._  

_And, well... surprise!  You’re grandparents._

_I didn’t write this letter for a very long time, and River thinks that’s down to me hating myself for how I lost you.  It is.  But what’s worse is hating myself for how you lost her.  I didn’t answer you, Amy, but yeah.  I’d a family once before.  And then I didn’t.  I knew exactly how that never, ever gets easier.  How you’ll never stop hurting, and it only dulls a bit when you tell yourself that she wasn’t ever really yours._

_She is yours.  We all are.  But I know what I did to you.  I broke your family so I could have mine._

_Cause I could’ve changed it for you.  I could’ve gone back to when she was your little mate Mels, scooped her up and brought her to you so you could raise her up properly.  It would’ve taken the entire tangled mess of causality from the day I met her and unwritten it all; her life and my life and yours would look nothing like they do.  Bit dangerous?  More than a bit.  But that’s not why I didn’t._

_I promised River the day I met her that I wouldn’t change a single thing about our life together.  That’s not the only reason why, though it’s certainly the reason for so much of what I’ve done, and for what I can’t do.  It’s really just down to this: I’m a selfish old man.  Your daughter deserves better than the mess I’ve made of her life, and so do you, but I couldn’t let her go._

_Spent so much of our life together being too afraid of the end to live the middle properly.  I know you both saw what an idiot I was.  I’ve really tried my best to quit that, but I’ll never stop being afraid.  Loving people, when you know damn well what always happens to people you love… well, it’s pretty fucking harrowing.  But I do.  I love her so much, sometimes it chokes me when I try to find the words, but I keep trying anyway, cause after all this damn time she fucking deserves to hear it._

_(Oh, sorry about the language.  I’m Scottish now.  River says I’ve got a complex.  Thought you’d enjoy that, Pond.)_

_And we were both scared to death to start a family.  Always did think the best things in life are at the other end of being bloody terrified, but I wasn’t quite applying that correctly.  Turns out there’s loads more terrifying and wonderful things than a bit of mortal peril._

_I know you know exactly how shite this bit feels, so I won’t bother trying to describe it.  We got those few precious years with our little girl that you never got with Melody.  I’m so grateful and so sorry for that.  I know I don’t have to ask you to love and care for Athena.  If she has to be anywhere in the universe but with us, I’m glad it’s with you.  Ponds, you’ve got a hell of a granddaughter.  She’s so bright and curious and clever and loving.  She’s going to be amazing.  Runs in the family, and not on my side.  Only wish we could be there to see it.  Can’t quite believe yet that we won’t be._

_Night on Darillium’s nearly over.  This was meant to be the end for me and River, but I won’t let that happen.  On my life, I’ll spend every bloody minute of the rest of however many millennia I’ve got fighting for and caring for your daughter.  If you could just do the same for ours, right now.  None of us is ever in the proper order, eh?_

_Ponds, it still doesn’t seem possible that we’ll ever get to see you again.  I’m so sorry, for everything.  When we were all together, the four of us, it was one of the happiest times of my lives.  I hope getting to know your granddaughter will be as happy for you.  She’s very lucky to have you.  So were we._

 

[Earth, 2012]

The crackle of electricity and the whiff of smoke and ozone were swallowed up by screeching brakes on the cross-street and the steam from a subway grate.  Milly crouched down behind a skip, giving the tiny hand in hers a comforting squeeze.

“Alright?” she whispered, looking into little Athena’s huge, dark eyes.

She sniffled and nodded.

“You’re being very brave.  We need to hurry now, and there’s going to be loads of things you’ve probably never seen before, but don’t be scared, yeah?  I’ve got you.”

Athena nodded again.

“Okay,” Milly said, more to herself than anything, as she stood.  “Just pretend everything’s normal.  We’re just going for a stroll in the park.”

“Um, Miss, um, Milly,” Athena mumbled, tugging on her sister’s hand.  “Why’s there so many lamps on?”

Oh.  

“It’s not lamps, sweetie,” she said gently.  “The sun is out.  It’s daytime." 

“Oh,” Athena replied, sniffling again looking thoughtful.  “I never saw a day before.”

Milly watched her for a moment before smiling with forced cheer.  “Hold my hand tight, okay?”

Athena nodded solemnly, her eyes still wide and wet.

She let out a little gasp as they emerged into direct sunlight.  They crossed Central Park South amidst a throng of people and turned onto one of the walking paths that led into the park.  Milly pulled her nav-comm from her jacket pocket and looked from the flashing points on the map to the trails ahead.  She didn’t _have_ to come and check on them first.  She had the coordinates for the TARDIS, parked all the way over at Fulton Ferry in Brooklyn.  Honestly, just the knowledge that her father had ever ridden the New York subway was bizarre enough to tempt her to catch a glimpse of this him in person.  Just a peek.

After all, they needn’t worry about being spotted.  They’d never met before. 

She unstrapped the Vortex manipulator from her wrist and tucked it into her pocket with the nav-comm before taking Athena’s hand again.

It was a lovely spring day, really: birds chirping, children shouting and running about, people in joggers hurrying by, couples walking dogs and pushing prams.  It was hard to reconcile with the knowledge that they were here on the run, stowing away into the past to escape capture.

She spotted them not very far into the park, spread out on a huge flat stone with a familiar looking picnic hamper.  Three figures, and at a distance Milly recognised the young, bow tied Doctor from pictures and that particularly memorable bit with the cooking show.  And the woman with flaming red hair.  The one who must be Rory was lying down, and if he was still there, she had plenty of time.  Against her better judgment, she tugged Athena over to a nearby bench where they could observe from a discreet distance.

“Is that them?  Gran and Grandad?” Athena whispered.

“Yeah,” Milly replied, pulling her sister close to her side, eyes glued to the peaceful scene before them.  They were just as she’d imagined.  And… Dad.  It was so very strange, in person.  No wonder Mum called that one Babyface.

“Which one’s Grandad?” Athena whispered. 

“Oh.  Um.  That one,” Milly pointed to Rory, who was still on his back on the rock.  “And the guy next to Gran… well… he’s Dad.”

Athena looked up at her like she’d grown another head.  “That’s not Daddy.” 

The young Doctor was reading aloud with a gleeful smile on his face, practically vibrating with cheerful, manic energy even as he sat in place.  They were too far away to make out his words, but his enthusiasm was clearly audible.

“Well,” Milly replied carefully, “not yet.”

Athena frowned in thought.  “Miss Milly—”

“You can just call me Milly, sweetie,” she said, tearing her eyes away from the trio in front of them to look down at Athena.

“Um.  Milly.  Are you sure you’re my sister?”

She smiled.  “Positive.  You’ll see, someday.”

Just then, Rory clambered to his feet.

“Okay, we’d better get going,” Milly whispered.

They hurried along the path as it wound away from the picnic site, over a little bridge, and behind a thick cluster of trees.  Milly strapped on the manipulator again and keyed in the coordinates, and with a zap, they were on a pebble shore, standing in front of the TARDIS. 

“Gran?” Athena asked, looking up at the blue box in confusion. 

Milly pulled the long chain holding her key from beneath her shirt.  “Yep!” she said brightly.  “This is what she usually looks like, actually.  C’mon, let’s see if she’s got your room.”

The TARDIS hummed in happy recognition as they entered.  They hurried along the outside wall of the control room, all glass and knobs and warm whimsy.  Athena looked around her as they went, wide-eyed and curious.

“Gran looks happy,” she said, smiling for the first time since they’d departed Darillium.

Milly bit her lip and said nothing.  From what she knew, today would be the end of that for a long while.

They hurried down a winding corridor, moving deeper and deeper into the TARDIS.  Honestly, it was a wonder Dad didn’t get stowaways more often.  It didn’t exactly seem hard.  Then again, it probably helped to have the ship herself conspiring to hide you. 

“Here,” Milly said, when the familiar push in her mind prompted her.  “I bet this is it.”  

She slid open a nondescript door, revealing a bedroom all in deep blue, with metallic gold stars, moons and planets painted on the walls.  Athena hurried inside and jumped onto her bed, grabbing the teddy bear there and squeezing it tight to her chest.  They’d taken nothing with them from Darillium but the books and letters their mother had hastily shoved into Milly’s arms.  

She swallowed and pushed those thoughts away.

“The door’s gone!” Athena cried suddenly, pointing at a bare wall to the left in alarm.

“What door?”

“There’s s’posed to be a door!  To Mummy and Daddy’s room!”

“Oh, well, the TARDIS must have moved it, so we won’t be found.  We’ve got to hide for now, remember?” Milly soothed.

Athena nodded.

“Here,” Milly said, walking over to the little book case near the foot of the bed.  “We’ve some time to wait.  Which is your favourite?”

Around twenty pages into _The Wind in the Willows,_ the TARDIS suddenly gave a screech and pitched from side to side.  Milly just managed to catch Athena before she was tossed across the room. 

“What is it?” Athena cried, clinging tightly to Milly’s arm with one little hand and to her teddy bear with the other.

“Nineteen thirty-eight, I think,” Milly winced.  “We’ll be there soon.”

___

They crept out of Athena’s bedroom and through the corridor, lingering just out of sight of the control room to listen.

“Just a moment,” the Doctor was saying.  “Final checks.”

“Since _when?”_  Clearly Amy’s voice; sassy and Scottish.

A few moments later, the TARDIS door shut behind them.

“Okay,” Milly whispered.  “When we leave the TARDIS, we’ve got to be quick and very quiet.  Don’t let go of my hand, and if you see any statues, tell me right away and _keep looking at them_.” 

“Statues?” Athena asked.

Milly smiled weakly.  “It’ll be fine.”

She waited until she was sure they’d all cleared out of the building before stepping out of the TARDIS.  It wouldn’t do to have Athena catch a glimpse of Mum.  It’d make things worse.

It was a long way in the inhabited dark to the cemetery, but she didn’t dare use the Vortex manipulator.  Any additional fluctuation of artron energy in this place could spell disaster.  

“Taking a cab, then,” she muttered to herself.  

Well, she said _taking…_

___

Milly watched the sun rise over the Manhattan skyline from the driver’s seat.  Athena had long ago fallen asleep on the passenger’s side, curled up with her teddy bear under Milly’s jacket.  It was good that she’d slept through the paradox resetting.   

Milly had never felt anything like it before.  The mad, chaotic swirling of time energy spinning through her head, the timeline she’d been living in snapping loose and careening off into an alternate reality that suddenly never was.  She felt dizzy and sick and there was a roaring in her ears getting _louder and louder_ — and then, suddenly, everything stopped.  All was still and silent.  She opened the window to take a gulp of air, and it felt damp and clean and cool, not crackling and shimmering with artron energy as reality shredded and shifted.  She smelled dew on the grass and heard birds singing in the violet pre-dawn light, and the taste of time faded from her tongue.

She settled back into her seat, panting.  Well, that was done.  They’d made it, and now no one could follow after them.  It was left in others’ hands to make the universe safe for the Doctor’s daughters by the time the distortion over New York had resolved enough for them to travel safely.  All that was left for her to do now was… stay.

When she felt a little calmer, she reached into her knapsack.  As the dim glow of dawn began to slowly resolve the dark interior of the car into hazy shapes in the grey, she opened one of the letters her mother had given her as she prepared to flee Darillium.  When she unfolded the paper, there was a little stack of photos tucked inside.  She held the first close to her face, tilting it to catch the faint light.  Her parents and Athena, pretty recent from the look of her, bundled up in the snow in front of the little blue house, standing on that mad chimera of snow architecture they’d carved out.  The next was just the two of them, clearly taken from her mother’s outstretched hand, as she grinned and tucked her head into her father’s shoulder.  He had on that look that was sort of a vaguely embarrassed scowl trying in vain to cover a ridiculous smile.  Milly couldn’t help but smile too as she looked at them.  

She laughed out loud when the next photo showed her mother, extremely pregnant, wielding a blaster in one hand and an utterly unamused expression.  Next were a series of snapshots of newborn Athena, first in her mother’s arms, then her father’s, then the three of them asleep in a sort of pile on the sofa. An older toddler Athena, face and hands covered in cake.  Athena curled up asleep with Vincent, in the midst of a heap of torn wrapping paper under the Christmas tree.  Athena sitting in Nardole’s lap, mouth open wide in what had to be a scream of laughter.

Nardole had volunteered to take Athena back to Manhattan.  It had been a bit of a shock for her parents when Milly turned up again with the dawn on Darillium.  They’d no reason to expect to have to explain her to Amy and Rory too; it would’ve been confusing enough without her appearing in the story out-of-sequence.

She was nearing the end of the pile of photos.  There was one of her father in the red velvet coat, one arm around her mother in her shiny green dress, standing in front of the TARDIS doors.  It seemed a posed photo, like a mum would take of her kid and their date about to head off to prom, but they were looking at each other rather than the camera.

Milly gasped quietly in surprise at the last photo.  It was from the day she received her doctorate.  She stood in her cap and gown, between her mother in her doctor’s gown and tam with the red-lined hood for Luna, beaming with pride, and her father, who was giving her bunny ears.  Neither of them had known who she was, then.  They just loved her anyway.

She smiled wistfully as she finally returned her eyes to the view through the windscreen, watching from where she’d parked at the edge of the cemetery as the sun appeared in earnest and the warm rays burned off the mist. 

About half an hour later, Rory appeared.  Milly sucked in a breath as she watched him.  He spun about in confusion, calling out _Amy!_ and _Doctor!_ , and finally gripped his hair with both hands as he stood still, staring at the ground in thought.  Then he calmly sat back on the grass.  

Either he was even more unflappable than she’d been told, or he didn’t know.  But then, she supposed he wouldn’t.  They’d gone back for him once before.

It was only minutes before Amy materialised.  Rory leapt to his feet and she threw herself into his arms.  She was shouting and crying and though Milly couldn’t make out the words, it was easy enough to guess.  As Rory held her and talked with her quietly, his body language shifted from confusion and disbelief to stunned stillness.  He was shellshocked.

She ought to give them a bit of time alone to come to terms with it.  

Or, maybe, she should help them with that.

“Hey, Athena,” she whispered, brushing her hand over her sister’s cheek.  Athena stirred slightly and gave a little incoherent groan.

“Come on, sweetie.  We’ve things to do, people to see!”

She gave another little whimpery mumble and then was breathing quietly and evenly again.  Poor dear was exhausted.  It hadn’t been an easy night.

Milly slipped the letter and photos back into her knapsack with the journals and slung it over her shoulder, before walking round to the passenger’s side and lifting Athena from the seat.  She locked her arms together under Athena's bottom, her sleepy head resting on her shoulder and legs dangling.

Then she kicked the cab door shut and began her walk into the cemetery.

Rory looked up as Milly approached, brow furrowing as he tapped Amy’s back until she turned her tear-streaked face in Milly’s direction.  They both looked completely shattered and scared.  Hopefully she wouldn’t totally make a cock-up of this.  

“Oh my god,” Amy said, incredulous, _“Mels?_  I mean, Ri— I mean— Rory, they’ve figured it out!”  Milly tried not to wince as Amy’s face broke into a smile of delight and relief as she laughed and began to run toward her.  “How is it you?  How—” she suddenly stopped short as the distance closed between them.

“Sorry,” Rory called after a moment, his voice rough as he walked up to them.  Amy seemed frozen by her sudden realisation, her face fallen.  “Difficult day.  You know, uh, cemetery and all.”  He cleared his throat.  “You, uh, just look an awful lot like someone we… know.”

“Yeah,” Milly offered him a sympathetic smile.  “I’ve seen the photos.”

 

 


End file.
